


Fair and Square

by judelaw



Category: Captain Marvel (2019)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Jude Law talking about how Yon-Rogg has genuine feelings for her and especially likes her human side, Pre-Relationship, Sparring, Yonvers - Freeform, lots of teasing, made me write this so blame him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 01:16:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18216227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/judelaw/pseuds/judelaw
Summary: After another night of her banging against his door, crying from the nightmares she suffered from, he decided to take different measures to comfort her. All the listening (even though there wasn’t much she could tell him to begin with), all the encouragement, all the gentle hugs weren’t enough anymore to keep her mind distracted.To Vers fighting wasn’t soothing, he knew that, but it would hopefully help to shift her focus from the distress she endured (and couldn’t change anyway) to her abilities, the power within her. If she would find her physical strength, she would eventually find mental strength as well.





	Fair and Square

**Author's Note:**

> The title was inspired by this little video I made yesterday (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PWCCqrtQos) because the song was obviously made for their sparring sessions.

„Are you sure about this?”

“Vers…”

“What if I hurt you?”

_“Vers.”_

He sighed softly, walking back to her and smiling encouragingly as Vers just stood still, looking incredibly lost and way too small for this giant training mat. Yon-Rogg knew she had been a soldier on C-53 but judging by her stature and the general muscular system Terran’s have, their army’s standards were much lower than what he was used to. Now that she had his blood in her though, she’d be strong enough to become a part of the Starforce like the Supreme Intelligence wanted - _if_ she would get the proper training. And he would be more than happy to provide her with it.

It had only been a couple of weeks since she woke up but her body had already healed enough for them to start sparring which he knew because he barely left her side since she arrived on Hala. After all had he not only been the one to bring her to his home planet in the first place, he also saved her life by sharing his blood and therefore she was _his_ responsibility. Not just her training (despite it playing a major role in their life from now on) but everything else she needed as well, whether it was knowledge or comfort, was his task from now on.

The Supreme Intelligence only talked about getting her in a shape in which she would be able to serve their purposes but that wasn’t enough _for Yon-Rogg_. Vers was completely alone on this to her foreign planet. She knew no one. In fact, she didn’t even know _herself._ The strong – while fearful but he had learnt early on in his career that these two traits didn’t exclude each other – warrior who had tried (and succeeded) to stop him from getting the core had now completely vanish. Instead he was looking into the eyes of a weak and scared trainee.

But he knew this warrior was still in her, even a better one with the photon energy, and he wouldn’t rest until he got her back to her old self - the best version of herself.

After another night of her banging against his door, crying from the nightmares she suffered from, he decided to take different measures to comfort her. All the listening (even though there wasn’t much she could tell him to begin with), all the encouragement, all the gentle hugs weren’t enough anymore to keep her mind distracted.  
  
To Vers fighting wasn’t soothing, he knew that, but it would hopefully help to shift her focus from the distress she endured (and couldn’t change anyway) to her abilities, the power within her. If she would find her physical strength, she would eventually find mental strength as well.

It was a whole new experience to Yon-Rogg having to deal with a trainee that refused to even get started as the all the ones he had trained before were usually overly eager, immediately exposing their weakness by rather doing than thinking beforehand. Vers was the exact opposite, so he had told her to just start, to _not_ think about it but she was still hesitating.

“I will not hurt you. I’m only going to block your blows, I promise.” He softly squeezed her shoulder.

She looked away from him, nervously rubbing her arm as she shifted her weight from one foot to another: “But what if you _don’t_ manage to block one of my hits?”

He grinned, mostly to not laugh at her. Now placing both of his hands on her slim shoulders, he tentatively tried to force her to face him, to look straight into his eyes. She immediately avoided his glance, however.

“Trust me; I _won’t_ miss any of them.”

Something on her face changed. It was like he had unknowingly pushed a button even she was not aware of - or maybe not aware of _anymore_. Yon-Rogg immediately adopted and changed his approach. He didn’t want his warriors to show any kind of emotion. Of course he was aware he couldn’t stop them from _having_ any but it had always been a priority to him to preach about the importance of _hiding_ emotions so the enemy couldn’t use them to their advantage. And _this_ was exactly the reason why.

If encouragement had reached its limit he would have to resort to manipulation.

He let go of her shoulders, turning his back to her as he walked a few feet away, waving his hand in a careless manner: “Alright. I guess training you would be useless anyway. You’d _never_ be able to land even a single hit.”

Yon-Rogg could almost hear her heart beating fast as she started to get angry, furious even.

“ _Of course_ I could.” She tried to sound as calm and collected as possible but he could see right through that. “I’d kick your ass.”

Now _this_ was the Vers he had met at the lake.

He still didn’t face her, resting his hands in the pockets of his training uniform as he tried to make himself look as little intimidated by her as possible. For a moment he even though about yawning but that would have been too theatrical.

“We should just go back to sleep-“

Without any further hesitation Vers rushed forward to throw a punch at him, knowing fully well it wasn’t honorable at all to attack him from behind but she was too angry to care. How _dared_ he suggest she couldn’t beat him?

Expecting the attack, Yon had spun around, avoided her first by twisting his body sideways and used her momentum to block her feet with one of his, causing her to lose balance and almost fall over if he wouldn’t have caught her.

He had meant his promise of not harming her in any way.

She needed a moment to process what happened but then immediately turned around, using the arm that was holding her as a strut, trying to ram her elbow into his face. It surprised him as he hadn’t expected her to start another attempt so quickly but he was still faster than her. Pulling back the arm that had supported her before, she started to fall again, immediately losing the height she needed to even get close to his face. Before she hit the ground, her trainer had grabbed her shirt with the other hand to interrupt her way down, completely erasing the force the impact would have had if she had hit the floor at that speed, and only let go of her once she was only a few inches away from the mat.

He looked down at her annoyed face, smiling smugly: “Kicking my ass, huh?”

Vers tried to make him lose his balance by kicking against his knee pits but of course Yon-Rogg had also expected that, easily eluded the attack and pressed her leg back to the mat in a way that forced her to lie on her side. He took advantage of the weak posture by letting himself fall next to her, pushing his knee against her back to turn her around and make her lie on her stomach as he pinned her down with his weight, preventing her from being able to move.

Of course he made sure to not apply _too_ much pressure; just enough to hold her in place, to make her feel more uncomfortable than anything. She groaned and for a moment Yon-Rogg was worried he had accidentally hurt her but when she buried her face into the mat he realized she was just frustrated. _Incredibly_ frustrated.

He chuckled as he stood up again, releasing her. Even though she was absolutely no challenge to him, he was still having more fun than he ever had training someone.

She lifted herself up, staying on her hands and knees for a moment until she threw her entire body weight against his legs. To her credit, he hadn’t expected her to try yet _again_ and was caught off guard but he still managed to avoid her, though he was stumbling this time.

He couldn’t help but to smile. She must have realized by now her attempts would _all_ end up like this, yet she still tried, refusing to give up no matter how hopeless the situation was. Just like at the lake. While it wasn’t necessarily the most intelligent thing, he still admired her for this perseverance.

She was nothing like a Kree _should_ be. She was impulsive, emotional and lagged any kind of discipline. But that was _exactly_ why he started to really like her. No other soldier would have dared to tell Yon they’d _‘kick his ass’_ , it was utterly disrespectful to talk to your superior like that, but with her he took no offence in it. It actually amused him.

He knew it was his responsibility to change her, to make her into the Kree warrior she should be – and he would do everything within his power to teach her how to hide her emotions, to stop being so impulsive – but in a way he also hoped she’d never change.

Vers was lying on her back breathing heavily, more out of frustration than exhaustion, as Yon-Rogg leaned over the smug expression remaining on his face.

“You know, my ass is up here.” He teased, offering his hand to pull her back up again. She mumbled something that sounded dangerously close to ‘shut up’ but took it anyway.

Back on her feet she immediately went into an attack position: “I was just holding back to not hurt you.”

They both knew it was an obvious lie but this back and forth between them had started to become a habit and it was hard to stop it now. Especially because neither of them _wanted_ it to.

She threw a few more punches at him, all of which he blocked with ease, before she resorted to pure force again, throwing her entire body weight against him. He had taken a step back to steady himself and just easily caught her with his own body, not sure how else he could have prevent her from harming herself. When he had promised to not hurt her he didn’t realize he would have to constantly stop her from hurting _herself_.

He embraced her to hold her in place.

“Use your head, Vers. Not your fists.”

Knowing exactly that this wasn’t what he meant, she used the little mobility she had to jump up, headbutting his chin. Hearing his faint moan already felt like a victory, causing her to smile brightly. She was so busy being happy about finally having landed a blow that she completely neglected her (already little to begin with) defense, leading to her falling over when he released his grip and pushed his knee into her pits to make her lose balance.

He had caught her again before she hit the mat and this constant sparing made her angrier than his ability to block every attack. It’s where his _true_ power shined through. Avoiding her blows was one thing but to even have the time to spare her from hurting herself was what made her mad.

Vers swung her entire arm around get rid of the arm that was holding her shirt and before she even processed this sparkling feeling and warmth inside her fist, she had already shot a photon blast at Yon-Rogg. He flew a good amount of the sparring mat backwards before he hit the ground with a pained moan.

It wasn’t like she didn’t know she had the ability to do this, Yon-Rogg had told her _everything_ about the photon energy and inhibitor and had promised to teach her how to control it, but to see it in action – completely _out of_ control – was terrifying. She didn’t mean to do this. She just wanted to hit him with her hand, not photon.

Her stomach dropped as she ran to him in panic. She had hurt _him_ – the one person who cared about her, who bothered to spend time with her, who made her feel less alone. Vers had tried to talk to others, to make a few friends, to get along with everyone, but Kree warriors weren’t the most welcoming people. It wasn’t like anyone mistreated her – though she did feel like Minn-Erva hated her for no reason – and she liked to think Yon-Rogg would stop them if they ever tried doing so, but she still was an outsider.

She didn’t want to bother him so much, to annoy him almost every night by waking him up. She really had tried to stay in her bed and fall back to sleep whenever she had another dream but she just couldn’t. Alone in the dark she felt so helpless, so vulnerable despite knowing nothing could harm her. Yon was never angry with her and had told her time and time again she could _always_ come to him if she needed something – no matter what. But she didn’t want to abuse his offer, his patience. She couldn’t stand the thought of getting on his nerves, of losing her only friend.

And now she had hurt him like this.

“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to do that!” Tears filled her eyes as she watched him slowly sitting up, obviously in pain. He must _hate_ her. He would never forgive her. He-

“Are you alright?” Yon-Rogg slightly rubbed the spot where she had hit him as he looked up to her, serious concern in his eyes.

She didn’t understand the question.

He gently reached out to her arm, pulling her hand closer to examine it for potential injuries. They didn’t know _exactly_ how her body would react to the photon even if itself was the generator and he was relieved to see she was completely fine – her tears had alarmed him a lot.

“I’m so sorry!” She cried.

“I thought you _wanted_ to kick my ass.” He joked to calm her down but it wasn’t working at all. Yon didn’t realize _how_ awful she felt for having shot him accidentally.

“It was an accident! I swear, I-“

He quickly pulled her into a hug, hands caressing her back: “I know. Don’t worry.”  
Vers automatically hid her face in his shoulder just like she did when he comforted her after a nightmare, though she didn’t feel like she deserved his affection. Not after what she had done.

“It’s not your fault.”

Yon-Rogg huddled his cheek against her head, holding her close. He was glad it was still way too early for anyone else to be in the trainings hall – no one should see her like this. She would be seen as weak and Yon wanted to avoided that at all costs. Not only because it simply wasn’t true but also because he had noticed she already had a hard time fitting in and he didn’t want it to be even more complicated for her.

When she calmed down enough for him to be sure she coul really listen to him, he reassured her: “We’ll work on this. _Together_. No matter how long it will take and how often I will end up on the sparring mat like this.”

She wiped her tears away, smiling slightly: “Getting your ass handed to you like this once isn’t enough?”

“That was cheating.”

“I can’t remember you told me to _not_ use photon blasts.”

“You’re right, I should really stop expecting you to have common sense.”

She pushed him playfully before she could think about it and because immediately laughed she never started to do so.

However she was still worried.

“Are you _really_ okay?”

“You are not that strong that you could _actually_ hurt me, Vers.” Not yet.

“Maybe _we_ should work on that then. _Together_.”

He quickly placed a foot behind her, pushing against the center of her chest which caused her to lose balance and fall onto the sparring mat. This time he didn’t catch her.

“ _We_ should work on your leg posture first.”

She grinned; glad he finally stopped sparing her and already looked forward to their next training sessions when he offered his hand again to pull her up again.


End file.
